Call for Reform in End of Life Care as MPS Debate Assisted Dying

26 March 2012

 CALL FOR REFORM IN END OF LIFE CARE AS MPS DEBATE ASSISTED DYING

 

> MPs will for the first time debate the application of the law on assisted dying for terminally ill people in a key debate taking place this afternoon (27 March).

> The Backbench Business Committee session on the Director of Public Prosecution's Policy on assisted suicide (1) is also a chance for Parliamentarians to express whether their views reflect public opinion in favour of the DPP's approach.

> Vice Chair of Dignity in Dying's all party parliamentary group on Choice at the End of Life, Caroline Lucas MP, hailed the debate as a "crucial step forward".

> She called on Parliament to endorse a flexible and compassionate approach to prosecuting cases of assisted suicide - a crime which carries a maximum 14 year prison sentence.

> Caroline Lucas MP said: "This debate is a crucial opportunity to consider a more compassionate legal framework for end of life care. The DPP has set out a reasonable, fair approach to prosecution on assisted suicide, and I call on MPs to support it.

> "Few of us would wish anyone to suffer against their wishes at the end of life. So we must consider how our current laws protect people confronting such momentous decisions, and ensure dignity for the terminally ill.

> "There is no doubt that those who maliciously or irresponsibly encourage suicide should be prosecuted. But it is not in the public interest to prosecute a normally law abiding citizen who helps a loved one to die on compassionate grounds.

> "MPs must ask themselves whether those who assist someone to die should face automatic prosecution - and whether a normally law-abiding citizen should face prosecution for a one-off compassionately motivated act.

> "Regulation, clarity and openness should guide public policy in this area, rather than an understandable desire to turn a blind eye."

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> ENDS


> Notes for Editors


> 1) The Suicide Act 1961 includes the provision that the DPP has discretion over whether or not to prosecute in individual cases of assisted suicide. In 2009 Debbie Purdy, who has primary progressive multiple sclerosis, took her legal case to the Law Lords (now the Supreme Court). Debbie wanted clarity on the law and wished to know whether her husband was likely to be prosecuted if he accompanied her to Switzerland to have an assisted death. In their judgement the Law Lords instructed the DPP to make clear the factors that he takes into account in deciding whether to prosecute someone for assisting a suicide. The result was the DPP's Prosecuting Policy on cases of assisted suicide.

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